bigglesfandomcom-20200215-history
Feu sur la Provence 1 (Lombard)/plot
Pierre Lemaitre, a friend of Biggles', is a pilot with the Protection Civile, operating Catalina fire-fighting tanker aircraft from Marignane in the south of France. He has been studying the pattern of fires his unit had been fighting and suspects there is something suspicious going on in the Saint-Victoire area. He tells his unit commander who allows him to continue his discreet investigations. Pierre leaves base for home but on the way, his car is rammed by another and pushed into a ravine. Over in England, Biggles is giving flying instruction to a student when Bertie calls with news about Pierre's death. Biggles flies to Marseilles. After the funeral, Pierre's wife, Marianne, approaches Biggles. She suspects foul play. In recent days, Pierre had grown irritable and secretive. He had spent time ticking off the locations of fires on a map. He had also been accessing old files on events dating back to the end of the Second World War. Marianne thinks Pierre has been silenced because of some information he had gathered. She wants Biggles to investigate, in memory of their friendship. Biggles visits Pierre's fire fighting squadron and who should he meet but ... Air Commodore Raymond and Bertie! The commander of the fire fighting squadron explains that for some time Pierre had been investigating the possibility that some of the fires were deliberately started and connected. He had apparently discovered something, no one knows what, which had interested the French secret service. Raymond adds that Pierre's work revealed a big piece of information about something going back to the end of the war. He couldn't say more as it was still a state secret, but British intelligence had agreed to cooperate with France on this topic. He would like Biggle and Bertie to continue where Pierre had left off. For cover, Biggles and Bertie would be enrolled with the Protection Civile as pilots undergoing training in fire-fighting techniques. The "training" for Biggles and Bertie begins. Off duty, they sneak into the locker room and find that Pierre's locker has already been searched. There must be a mole at the base! Biggles then remembers a remark Marianne had made to him that Pierre always hide her love letters under his locker. He looks and finds a file! It contains a lot of puzzling leads. There is a map of all the fires, documents about the purchase of land in the Saint-Victoire area and a Second World War file from the E.R.R. (the Einsatzstab Reichsletter Rosenberg, a German wartime organisation in charge of confiscating Jewish properties). There is also an inventory of the Stein art collection. It looks like they are making progress. But Lemaitre's enemies are also making progress. Whoever they are, they have heard of Biggles and know he has become involved and they redouble thir efforts. They also make some progress, finding the wreck of a truck in a ravine which has some useful documents. The next day, Biggles sends Bertie on an air reconnaisance of the Saint-Victoire area. Bertie combs the area in a Boisavia Mercurey and notices a lot of excavators digging. They all seem to belong to a company named S.S.P.I. Meanwhile Biggles goes to the Panier Quartier in Marseilles and calls on a man named Colombani. He is surprised but Biggles tells him he found his name in one of Lemaitre's files. Who is he and does the Stein collection mean anything to him? Colombani confesses. During the war he was a collaborator. On 15 August 1944, a German convoy of the E.R.R. left Marseilles loaded with the Stein collection headed or the Sainte Baume and Sainte Victoire area. He accompanied the convoy with another collaborator, Gerard Lenoir. The convoy stopped at the village of Vauvenargues where all the able-bodied men were rounded up. The convoy then left for the mountains with the prisoners, presumably to hide the Stein collection somewhere. The prisoners were then massacred. The convoy then attempted to head north but were ambushed and annihilated by a group of French resistance fighters. The resistance group was itself wiped out by a German division the next day and so the hidden Stein collection was never found. As for Lenoir, Colombani heard he left for Spain and he never saw him again. Biggles takes his leave, but moments later, an unknown person comes to Colombani's apartment and shoots him dead. Biggles and Bertie meet Raymond discreetly in Marseilles with what they have found. They press him to tell them more about the background. Raymond tells them about Sir Edward Stein, a naturalised British citizen and the son of George Stein. Sir Edward has been searching for his father's art collection which had been confiscated by the Germans in 1942. The British and French secret services had also been on the case for the last 20 years. Recently, their sources told them that there was a lot of excitement among former Nazis and their sympathisers about the prospects of finding the collection. Raymond promises to find out more about the S.S.P.I. Meanwhile he warns them to suspect everything and everyone. Leaving the meeting with Raymond, Biggles walks along the Marseilles streets and is kidnapped by a gang of toughs and brought to see Ange Pasamonici, the leader of the Marseilles mafia. He warns Biggles to lay off his investigations into the property dealings. They were merely honest real estate speculation. If Biggles did not leave them alone, they would have to act. Biggles is then chucked back onto the street. Back at the Marignane base, Bertie tells Biggles that Marianne had called and was very frightened. She had spotted people loitering outside her house. She had also mentioned something about Simon Wiesenthal. Meanwhile Bertie had also learnt that the S.S.P.I. was a Swiss real estate company which had been buying up land around the Sainte-Victoire area to build a recreational park, all apparently above board. Biggles and Bertie rush to Marianne's house. They find her on the floor, dying, She mutters something indistinct: "Lenoir.... Leger...." Outside, they chase a masked man who climbs over the backyard wall and into a black Alouette III helicopter. Biggles chases after him and grabs the skid just as the helicopter lifts off but the man knocks him off and back onto the ground. Biggles and Bertie make their statements to the police, keeping to the simple facts. The police chief remarks that he thinks they must be hiding something, but he rejects Biggles' suggestion to follow up on a helicopter. The next day, Biggles and Bertie call at the post office. The post mistress tells them Pierre Lemaitre had been corresponding with a foreign address: the Jewish Documentation Centre in Vienna. Simon Wiesenthal, the Nazi hunter! Pierre must have been on to something. At Marignane, Biggles is rostered for his first fire fighting mission with Leon, an experienced flight engineer. The siren goes off and they are scrambled. Over the scene of the fire, Leon begins to feel dizzy and ill. They manage to dump their load of water but suddenly a hail of machine gun fire rakes the cockpit. The aircraft is in trouble but they manage a mayday call before crash landing. Biggles drags Leon away from the wreckage but they are surrounded by flames. Back at Marignane, the squadron learns of Biggles' trouble but Bertie finds all the flight crew knocked out in deep sleep. Undeterred, he runs onto the tarmac and starts up a Criquet and heads for Biggles' last known position. Biggles and Leon spot Bertie and attract his attention. He lands the Criquet in a clearing. Biggles bundles Leon into the aircraft and is about to get in when he hears a cry for help. Biggles runs towards the source of the sound and finds a young girl on the ground with an injured ankle. He can't make it back to the plane so he carries her into some ruins nearby which is surrounded by the flames. Meanwhile, Bertie cannot wait any longer as the fire is about to engulf his plane. Sorrowfully, he takes off. Category:Plot summaries (derivative works)